Cancer patients can be treated with virus therapy, proves study

Scientists at the NHS Royal Marsden Hospital and the Institute of Cancer Research (ICR) have confirmed that an advanced way of treating cancer, using modified herpes virus, had improved the survival of cancer patients. By using genetically modified viruses to attack tumor cells, the melanoma skin cancer patients can be benefitted extensively.

This is the world’s first study, which proves that cancer can be treated with virus therapy.

Published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, this study was conducted with 436 patients, all of whom had aggressive, inoperable malignant melanoma.

The patients treated with the virus therapy – known as T-VEC – at an earlier stage survived on average 20 months longer than patients given an alternative.

The study represents a landmark: it is the first, large, randomised trial of a so-called oncolytic virus to show success.

The Independent reported that the cancer scientists have predicted that the study has added a new weapon to the arsenal of cancer treatments.

According to the report, the method – known as viral immunotherapy – functions by launching a “two-pronged attack” on cancer cells. The virus is genetically modified so that it cannot replicate in healthy cells.

It multiplies vigorously inside the cancer cells, bursting them from within. At the same time, other genetic modifications to the virus stimulate the body’s own immune response to attack and destroy tumours.

This virus therapy is being considered for use against advanced head and neck cancers, bladder cancers and liver cancers.

Kevin Harrington, UK trial leader and professor of biological cancer therapies at the ICR and an honorary consultant at the Royal Marsden told The Independent, “I hope having worked for two decades in this field, that it really is the start of something really exciting.”

“We hope this is the first of a wave of indications for these sorts of [cancer fighting] agents that we will see coming through in the next decade or so,” he added.

Speaking to The Independent, Dr Hayley Frend, science information manager at Cancer Research UK said the potential for viruses in future cancer treatments was “exciting.”

“Previous studies have shown T-VEC could benefit some people with advanced skin cancer but this is the first study to prove an increase in survival. The next step will be to understand why only some patients respond to T-VEC, in order to help better identify which patients might benefit from it,” she said.

Researchers have developed a new learning artificial intelligence (AI) system which can diagnose and identify cancerous prostate samples as accurately as any pathologist.

New mobile app can detect cancer.

According to the researchers, this holds out the possibility of streamlining and eliminating variation in the process of cancer diagnosis. It may also help overcome any local shortage of trained pathologists.

“This is not going to replace a human pathologist. We still need an experienced pathologist to take responsibility for the final diagnosis,” said lead author Hongqian Guo from the Nanjing University in China.

“What it will do is help pathologists make better, faster diagnosis, as well as eliminating the day-to-day variation in judgement which can creep into human evaluations,” Guo added.

For the study, presented at the 33rd European Association of Urology Congress in Copenhagen, researchers took 918 prostate whole mount pathology section samples from 283 patients, and ran these through the analysis system, with the software gradually learning and improving diagnosis.

These pathology images were subdivided into 40,000 smaller samples; 30,000 of these samples were used to ‘train’ the software, the remaining 10,000 were used to test accuracy.

The results showed an accurate diagnosis in 99.38 percent of cases (using a human pathologist as a ‘gold standard’), which is effectively as accurate as the human pathologist.

The app is just as effective as a pathologist. Pixabay

They were also able to identify different Gleason Grades in the pathology sections using AI; ten whole mount prostate pathology sections have been tested so far, with similar Gleason Grade in the AI and human pathologist’s diagnosis. The group has not started testing the system with human patients.

“The system was programmed to learn and gradually improve how it interpreted the samples. Our result show that the diagnosis the AI reported was at a level comparable to that of a pathologist. “Furthermore, it could accurately classify the malignant levels of prostate cancer,” Guo added. IANS